Unfortunately for Trudeau, it transpired that he did win and, once in office, reality soon reared its ugly head against many of the promises he had made to the Canadian electorate. Four modest deficits of under ten billion a year (to be erased by the end of his first mandate) have morphed into annual additions to the debt of many times that, with even the Finance Minister admitting that no end is in sight. The pledge that 2015 would be the last election ever contested under the Westminster system of First-Past-The-Post wilted once it became clear that Trudeau’s preferred option of ranked ballots was a non-starter with the opposition parties. Canadian fighter jets were pulled from the fight against ISIS in the Middle East, but our contribution to troops on the ground has intensified (with all the risks that are associated with it).

What has been allowed to transpire in our education system, from grade one through to post-secondary, should constitute a crime. Not only is it a slap in the face to have the gall to refer to a system that contains only the musings of a single political ideology an "education", but it’s also an absolute disgrace to democracy to have curriculums reflect only one political party’s aims. It took far too long, but it would appear that the mainstream right, both American and Canadian, have now become privy to the goings-on in our education system and are prepared to do something about it. There have been several prominent people speaking out about the ideological stronghold of the radical left within the education system, people who have been instrumental in bringing the problem of a one-party system to light. But their proposed solution, while a laudable start, will not in and of itself fix the problem.

People have the right to be angry about the Paris Agreement and the Conservative Party's symbolic support for it, but being a strategic thinker and having Machiavellian thoughts running through my head at all hours of the day, I can understand the strategy and the long term reasoning behind it. Right-wing pundits don't think much about winning because that's not their job. A politician's job is to win and to plot out a strategic course to victory. That's what Andrew Scheer was doing and we should trust his judgment. To start, Canada is in the Paris Agreement whether any of us like it or not. That has no chance of changing until 2019. Canada will also have a national carbon tax whether any of us like it or not. The motion to reiterate Canada's acceptance of climate change and the Paris Agreement was nothing more than a symbolic gesture—or another Liberal trap like M-103, which aimed to drive a wedge between Conservatives and to paint them as bigots for rejecting it.

The 2017 Federal Budget is what the show Seinfeld was to television, a budget about nothing. Bill Morneau tried his best to hide this behind glitzy language about how the government was equipping Canada and Canadians to face the challenges of the future. Spending announced in the past budget was repackaged and trotted out again, along with future commitments to do various things "in the fullness of time" and "at the appropriate juncture". When all the jiggery-pokery was put aside, however, there was no denying that the budget was all sizzle and next to no steak; the fact that the cancellation of a tax credit on public transit is the item that was cited most often in the days immediately following tells you all you need to know.

Many people think Harper lost the 2015 election due to niqab issues and a barbaric hotline controversy. Others think it was a nasty tone during the campaign. Some, like Brian Mulroney, shrugged and said, “The tides go in and the tides go out.” Maybe it was just time for a change. One issue that wasn’t given enough consideration was the policy regarding increasing the agefor OAS payments. Waiting until you’re 67, instead of 65, to get a few hundred bucks a month from the government might seem trivial to the middle-aged media and politicians running the government, but to many senior Canadians this was a single-issue voting decision. It was the right policy to implement, but it had negative electoral repercussions for Harper.

In the world of resource development, a new and frequently muttered term is being used to shut down the extraction and shipment of needed natural resources. You've probably heard it slink through the lips of Justin Trudeau and some of his cabinet ministers. It's something called “social license” and it loosely translates to communities granting permission to companies to develop resources in their areas. There is no real way to measure it, gauge it or recognize it, but the Liberal government is implementing social licensing into several review processes for approving pipelines. Without social license, they claim, pipelines can't be approved or built. Meanwhile, this same practice of gaining community approval is absent in the Liberal government's quest to reform Canada's electoral system.

It certainly cannot be said that Justin, the boy King, has been loitering on the job; he has been all the hare and none the tortoise when it comes to pursuing his agenda. He's racked up massive deficits (far in excess of the teeny, tiny ones of "a modest ten billion a year" he pledged to in the previous campaign), reversed himself on his commitments to the First Nations, taken down the Queen's portrait from the government's walls, withdrawn our jets from the fight against ISIS, and brought in an entirely unnecessary expansion to the Canada Pension Plan. What is most remarkable, however, is not these radical departures from the previous government of Stephen Harper that Trudeau so recently deposed from the halls of power, but how in one particular way Trudeau has not only stayed the course of his predecessor but gone further than he ever would have dreamed.

Our first-past-the-post (FPTP) voting
system is fine. Maryam Monsef's rhetoric about bringing Canada's
democracy into the 21st Century comes from her party's grab-bag of fun
words and platitudes. It's the same grab-bag that Justin used when he
was buttering up naïve students and first-time voters last fall.
They're fanciful words that serve no other purpose but to sell an
agenda. It's like a car salesman using your own emotional yearnings
to upgrade you to a Cadillac just to fatten his own wallet. His tried
and tested techniques are designed to bypass your logic and go
straight for your feelings. You don't need a new Cadillac, just like
Canada doesn't need a new electoral system, but those well-rehearsed
talking points are designed to make your emotions take control of the
wheel.

Canada is dying a slow death. Since 1972, we have had a
below-replacement fertility rate in Canada. This means women have
been having fewer children than needed in order to create population
stability. Experts thought this was temporary. Experts were wrong. In 1990, former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney saw the implications
on the horizon and introduced mass immigration as a band-aid
solution. By bringing in over 200,000 immigrants a year since 1990,
Canada pushed back the demographic implosion, but didn’t halt it
completely. Today there are more seniors than kids in our country. As a result
of this, our focus is more on healthcare than education. Pensions and
benefits are more important than innovating future prosperity. Our
economy has annually grown by only 1.59% over the past nine years
despite the Harper Conservatives doing everything they could to
encourage growth.

To
put it simply, fiscal conservatism is one of the few things the
Conservative Party has left to define itself. The party settled the gay
marriage debate and the abortion debate almost a decade ago. When it
comes to social issues, Conservatives have veered into libertarian
waters and blurred the lines that separate them from Liberals and
socialists. On economic policy, the Conservatives still stand for fiscal
prudence and balanced budgets. The natural consequence of fiscal
conservatism and minimal public spending is smaller government. If we do
away with this fundamental tenet, the Conservative Party would no
longer be a legitimate advocate for small government.

Under
the previous government of Stephen Harper, the Conservatives implemented
new rules making citizenship only attainable to those who had
demonstrated fluency in one of Canada’s two official languages. It was
one of the signature common-sense reforms brought in by the Tories that
made the Immigration portfolio one of their unquestionable areas of
success. A person choosing to make Canada his or her home should learn
to speak either English or French. If you’re unable to speak the main
languages of the land then good luck finding gainful employment, let
alone successfully integrating yourself into the wider cultural and
social landscape around you. The ability to communicate with one another
is a central element of human social interaction and, without it,
society simply does not exist.

Peter MacKay cited his desire to “spend more time with his family” as a reason to leave federal politics. He seemed genuine about this decision at the time and the fact that he left the party on good terms should put to rest any notion that would suggest otherwise. Right now MacKay has a newborn and a toddler. Their needs are great and the parenting stress is high. Sleeplessness and household management requires more energy. Leaving politics in order to be more present in early family life makes sense, but kids grow up. A 5 year old is easier to manage than a 2 year old. Harper had a young family when he was first Prime Minister and Justin Trudeau is doing it now. With a couple of state funded nannies and a conscious decision to balance the job with family life, the MacKay clan will flourish while MacKay acts as Prime Minister.

Self-made Canadian millionaire, Kevin O'Leary, recently suggested that he might throw in a bid to lead the Conservative Party. Although the feedback has been generally positive, some party supporters haven't been feeling the love. One such supporter is The Rebel's Brian Lilley. The pundit suggested that O'Leary has never identified as conservative and, therefore, shouldn't be considered by Conservative faithfuls. Lilley is one of the more tolerable conservative pundits at The Rebel, mostly because he usually takes a smooth, balanced libertarian approach to things. But in this case, Lilley's position on O'Leary's leadership bid is completely wrong. Kevin O'Leary is a rigid fiscal conservative. Just because he calls himself a political agnostic doesn't change that fact.

Former Veteran's Affairs Minister, Erin O'Toole, was one of the MPs who put his name forward for interim leadership, but lost out to Ambrose. O'Toole was first elected in his riding of Durham in a byelection in November of 2012 after the resignation of Conservative MP, Bev Oda, who had been caught in an expense scandal. Despite the nasty taste left in voters' mouths by Oda, O'Toole won this seat in a landslide, earning nearly 51% of the vote. Just over two years later, in January of 2015, O'Toole was named as the Minister of Veteran's Affairs, replacing the oft-criticized Julian Fantino. Without a doubt, Fantino had absolutely bungled the VA portfolio. Opposition had called for his resignation in late 2014 after a long string of failures, including the closing of many VA offices.

The middle class. The middle class. The middle class. It's one of the only things Justin Trudeau talks about. Trudeau wants to cut taxes for the middle class and raise them for the wealthy. He wants to invest in something called “middle class jobs”. He wants to strengthen the middle class, encourage the middle class, coddle the middle class, tickle the middle class, play catch with the middle class, gently caress the middle class and shield the middle class from the forces that threaten to push them backwards into the disgraceful abyss called the lower class. The disgraceful lower class. The class Trudeau hasn't mentioned once.

From what we've learned so far, Thomas Mulcair was a member of Quebec's Liberal Party before he pondered becoming a Conservative. During his time in the Quebec legislature, he poured praise on Britain's conservative wonder woman, Margaret Thatcher. But it's not his weird ideological back flips that voters should be worried about, it's his actions as a political figure tasked with holding Stephen Harper accountable. As media force-feeds Canadians details about a fraudulent senator and a $90,000 cheque meant to reimburse taxpayers, Mulcair's dubious past disappears into the shadows.

In 2012, Mike Duffy was one of four senators accused of falsely claiming residency outside of Ottawa in order to receive living expenses for his time spent working in Ottawa. In February of 2013, Duffy (along with Patrick Brazeau, Pamela Wallin and Mac Harb) became the subject of a forensic audit to determine whether or not his expenses were appropriate. Nigel Wright, then chief of staff for the Prime Minister’s Office, wrote Duffy a “gift” cheque for $90,172, and Duffy used that cheque to repay the inappropriate expenses. The Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner of Canada decided to investigate Wright’s “gift” to Duffy, and Duffy resigned from the Conservative caucus on May 16, 2013. On November 5, 2013, the senate made the decision to suspend Mike Duffy without pay for a span of two years. In May 2014, Mike Duffy was charged with fraud, breach of trust and bribery, amongst a variety of other charges.

Abolishing Aboriginal status and assimilating Aboriginals is exactly what the residential school system aimed to do. We assume that the Trudeau government's intentions were good because they were based on an idea of equality. However, burning up legal treaties and stripping legal statuses shouldn't have been expected to end well during the height of the Civil Rights Movement in the United States. The new proposals introduced by Indian Affairs Minister, Jean Chretien, were rejected by most First Nations...

When Stephen Harper slapped that 5% sticker over top of the 7% sign during the 2006 election campaign, he basically won the election right there and then. Many other variables combined to give the newly formed Conservative Party their first win, but that easy-to-understand tax cut resonated with average voters. During the election campaign in October, Stephen Harper should announce that, should a second majority be attained, the GST will fall from 5% to 3% over the course of the next mandate.

Stephen Harper's Conservatives are heading into one of the most important elections they've ever faced. Forget 2010 and the endless threats from the opposition to topple the Conservative minority. Harper wanted Jack Layton to help the Liberals pull the trigger on his government so he could finally win his long coveted majority. In 2011, Jack Layton did just that and his party soared to an historic win while the Conservatives won their majority. 2015 will be much different. This year, a Conservative minority would be the equivalent of a complete defeat.

Nothing sours the tongues of liberals like Canada's staggeringly successful oil industry. But it is the Saudis that are most vexed by Stephen Harper's relentless pursuit of growth in the industry. They are so vexed that they have come to the understanding that North America may be better off without him. This is not the main goal of Saudi Arabia and not every economist will agree, but the successful removal of Stephen Harper would be the equivalent of killing two birds with one stone.

In a memorable 2011 leadership debate, Jack Layton told Michael Ignatieff, "Most Canadians, if they don't show up for work, they don't get a promotion. You missed 70% of the votes." Michael Ignatieff, along with most if his high profile Liberals, like Bob Rae, had higher than average absenteeism in the House Of Commons between 2008 and 2011. Jack Layton made sure to remind Canadians that Michael Ignatieff wasn't ready to be promoted to the Prime Minister's Office.

Ever since Stephen Harper and his team of Conservatives took over the government, they’ve consistently applied tough on crime policies in Canada. Their critics do what their critics have been doing since 2006: whine and complain about the policies that favour victims instead of perpetrators. They claim punishing criminals doesn’t work and cite “science” to back them up. They claim the crime rate has been dropping for years, so consequently we shouldn’t worry about it, I guess. They claim that tough on crime policies are expensive for taxpayers, as though expenses have ever been an issue for public spending on things they personally agree with.

It's easy to remember the fear campaign launched against Stephen Harper by the Paul Martin campaign in 2006. The Liberals tried desperately to attack Harper on issues of abortion, on sending troops to Iraq, and on "sacrificing Canadian Healthcare for US-style tax cuts". One Liberal attack ad even warned Canadians that they were about to "elect one of the most pro-American leaders" in Canadian history.

It’s no secret that “The Environment” as an issue has been thoroughly hijacked by leftists. It’s too bad, because the sensible elements of environmental custodianship are inherently conservative. Think back to the Ducks Unlimited banquets or the old school farming organizations that had a vested interest in maintaining a healthy landscape.

When it comes to today's Liberals, I get the impression that they have lost their moral compass and are steering Canadians down a path of fewer individual freedoms and shaky moral standards. I also get the impression that many Liberal supporters don't really know what the party actually stands for.

One of the most disappointing failures of the Harper government has been their inability to modernize the military. When they swirled into office, they had big ambitions. New jet fighters were proposed, but are once again delayed. The Navy is still dealing with delayed simple ships and broken submarines.

Just this year it was found that Thomas Mulcair is one of Ottawa's biggest spenders. His largest expense comes from his employee salaries, which cost nearly $213,000. Last month it was also announced that the federal NDP are planning to open another...

Between February 5th and 23rd, Poletical asked Canadians who they would vote for if an election were held today. Unintentionally, Poletical did not receive any data from Quebec. The poll was shared on Twitter, Facebook, Reddit and various forms of social media.

Minimum wage is a contentious issue for free market conservatives, but it is one that will move the Conservative Party in a direction that could soften their image among independents and swing voters. The impact of a national minimum wage in Canada would be small and the effect on the economy would be minimal. With Alberta having the only minimum wage below 10.00, implementing a federally enforced minimum wage of 10.00 would be harmless to Canada's overall economic forecast.

Harper’s leftist critics like to paint Canada as a conservative dystopia in which everything good about the country is systematically being dismantled. Harper’s conservative critics are hesitant to criticise him too heavily, but there are grumblings throughout the grassroots.

Manipulating the business cycle to coincide with the election cycle isn’t really something that your average talking head broadcaster is going to jump into. It’s easier to just hate Harper and guess/hope he’ll pack it in because leftists want it that way. The result has been rampant speculation amongst leftists and media-types that Stephen Harper is going to quit early this year.

Through the month of November, Poletical asked Canadians who they would vote for in 2015 and whether their voting intentions have changed since this time last year. Included in the poll was a question asking who Canadians think is the most competent to lead the country. The poll was spread via Twitter, Facebook, and other forms of social media...

Four recent by-elections have shown a crack in Justin Trudeau's armour and in Canada's opinion polling methods, while the aftermath of the elections revealed the blatant and bloated bias of Canada's public broadcasting corporation. Two major Conservative strongholds in Manitoba failed to turn red last month, even though three separate opinion polls...

As the population grows, the economy should grow to absorb all the new entries into the work force. If it doesn't, the old and new will have to share the existing pie. If this happens, everyone gets a little less. Presently, less seems to be happening in Canada. What we have to do is expand the pie not only to absorb the new entries and give them a good wage...

Until recently, there was rampant speculation that Stephen Harper would step down before the next election. Kind of a “quit while you’re ahead” type of strategy. Liberal has-been, Warren Kinsella, wrote this article back in July and his sentiment wasn’t unique. When the whole senate scandal thing went down a few months ago, the Harper-haters were in ecstasy.

The Department of Immigration and Refugee Board has a budget of roughly $600 million. Cut the budget in half to $300 million. Accept 50% less immigrants and refugees in order to make this cut reasonable for the bureaucrats in the department. This way, not only do we all save money, but Canada can take a much needed break from the immigration firehouse.

During the reign of Jean Chretien, the Liberal Party Of Canada polled well above 40%. Today, after Dion and Ignatieff, a new sense of enthusiasm seems to have taken hold of liberals everywhere. Justin Trudeau has jolted the party into a tie with the Conservatives. Only a tie. There is no 50% polling and no certain lead. This enthusiasm isn't anywhere near what it once was, but that hasn't stopped the Liberal machine and Canada's media from hyping something that has turned out to be far more disappointing than what Liberals were actually hoping for last year.

When it comes to politics, many conservatives are troubled by two things: taxes and government deficits. On the first count, many of us just shrug our shoulders and pay our taxes. On the latter count, many of us complain and whine.

Canada’s National Debt is now well over $616,000,000,000.00 and this doesn’t include provincial and municipal debt, which easily pushes total public debt over $1 trillion. Finance Minister Jim Flaherty still insists that Canada will be back into surplus by 2015, but many people are becoming skeptical.

Opposition to term limits stretches far and wide. A common argument suggests that if voters are truly tired of a leader or representative that they will take the initiative to vote such a person out of office. History, however, hasn't always proven that theory. In a democracy, where voting is voluntary, apathy can often take hold in places where there are fewer options, comfortable wealth, or fear of change.

Last month Poletical asked its readers about conservatism and homosexuality. Our earlier poll found that 39% of Canadiansstill believe that being gay and conservative is a contradiction. Poletical decided to dig deeper and find out where this perception is more prevalent and what kind of voters were under this impression.

It’s probably happened to you. You’ve been at a party or gathering and a progressive type states boldly that “prostitution should be made legal, you know, so it’s safe!” Then some other progressive type will chime in with, “think of all the tax revenue!” Then everyone assures each other that they would never use a prostitute, but the option should be on the table, because of, you know...progressiveness.

The results are in and Poletical readers have spoken. Maxime Bernier is the Prime Minister of choice. At 34%, support for Bernier represents the direction that most people would like Canada to move. Pro-business, pro-freedom, pro-active. The surprising result is that 33% of people chose “other”.

In 2015 I predict that Stephen Harper will run and win the general election. I think the NDP and the Liberals will kill each other for the same voters and the Conservatives will tear through the middle with an even bigger majority than they currently have now.

There’s a lot of criticism being hurled at Stephen Harper and his Conservative government. I’m not talking about the typical left-wing grandstanding that always follows Stephen Harper around. I’m talking about criticism from the right. Criticism that is actually more dangerous, since people like this will actually support Harper during an election...or not.

The Idle No More movement has attempted to spread across Canada and beyond, promoting environmental protections and Aboriginal rights around the world. The only problem is that their message has gotten lost; similar to the Occupy Movement, which seemed like a random hipster BBQ in public parks, on corporate walkways, and various outdoor locations around the world. Their aims were unclear, mainly because they had so many and any sense of consistency vanished.

The world didn't end like it was supposed to. The Mayans weren't wrong, it was the “experts” who falsely translated the end of a simple calendar cycle. It was our instinctual need to consume and sell fear that triumphed over our reason. Not a single human being has been able to successfully and precisely predict the end of human existence.

I first heard about a progressive initiative in Calgary-Centre during a trip to a boutique farmers market earlier this year. A middle aged, hipster male was talking seriously about working out a plan to help ensure that the leftist progressive vote split didn’t allow the Conservative Party to retain it’s long held seat in...